A journey through the Decorated Apparel Industry

Hurricane drips on SGIA 2017

This was my second time working a SGIA show and a rare location of New Orleans(Nawlins). It felt like coming home a bit as I have always had friends that live here. This was likely my 7-8th timing visiting the city. Flying in on Friday, it was a surreal experience as there was a hurricane pointed right towards where my hotel was. Saturday-day came and with a few spits of rain, the mighty hurricane was thankfully much ado about nothing. Beyond that fizzle of anxiety, I grew excited to see some of the industry equipment debuts expected to be at the show. Namely a variety of digital printing equipment pieces. Brother’s GTX, M&R latest digital squeegee, and others were on my short list to explore. In addition to the new gens for Digital, I also wanted to learn more about dimensional film/materials from Siser and Stahls/TE. Several of our new The North Face and New Era products have brand logos done as a raised film-like piece of material. I had heard about Siser making something called “Brick”, but needed more input. I also quickly learned that S/TE was also coming soon on something similar. As our reps have been touring with the lines, they are inevitably getting asked about “how is that logo done?” Beyond the new materials, rumors were also quickly spreading about an Over/Under heat press(and extension) that was coming to market. Goal here is a balance or heating and pressure for more effective application. “You snooze, you lose” took effect as by the time I went to try and check out this new concept, it had been packed up. Elvis had left the building. 😦